Home Buying and Selling to Become Faster and Cheaper

PLANS TO make home buying and selling faster and cheaper by digitalising the process have been announced.

The plans will speed up around one million UK property transactions taking place each year and help prevent them from falling through.

Currently delays between agreeing a purchase and its completion average at almost five months. One of the key reasons for this is a lack of digitalisation, the government says. In Norway, transactions complete in around one month.

Information such as building control and highways information is predominantly paper-based or recorded in non-machine-readable formats. Where data is available electronically, there are not established protocols for accessing, sharing and verifying that data which leads to more delays.

Home Buying and Selling to Become Faster

Government plans are to share data more easily at the outset, minimising surprises encountered later in the process.

Currently, fall throughs – which impact one in three transactions – cost around £400 million a year, on top of the four million working days lost by conveyancers and estate agents – equivalent to £1 billion.

But under a fully digitalised home buying and selling process, the information key parties need – from mortgage companies to surveyors – will be available immediately, with identity checks carried out once.

Clear information early on will mean there are no surprises later in the transaction, which might cause it to fall through.

HM Land Registry (HMLR) is announcing a 12-week project to agree rules on data so that it can be shared between conveyancers, lenders and other parties. It will also lead 10-month pilots with councils to open up more of their data and making it digital. Government will progress plans for digital identity verification services in the property sector.

This will be delivered by the Digital Property Market Steering Group – a collection of industry and government experts chaired by MHCLG.

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